Far Tortuga (44 page)
Authors: Peter Matthiessen
Byrum?
Course in de night, if you cotch a spider web across de face, or if you might hear an old cow lowin where no cow belongin, den you know dat dey are dere …
Face forward into de bow, Byrum. And stay dat way.
Fuckin black Honduran!
Dass me, okay. I nigger to de bone. (
sighs
) Wodie mon? Shut up, okay? I got to sleep a little, so lay down all across de thwart, tween me and Byrum.
Maybe he get me in de night!
No, mon. He get
you
, den he know I get
him
. De only way he gone get you is if he get me first.
Polaris
The turtle sighs.
Wodie lies flat on his back on the middle thwart, fingertips trailing in the bilges, bund eye rolled upward to the dying stars.
In the bow Byrum shifts a little, settles down again, body twisted aft. Soon one eye opens, and when he draws a breath and holds it, Speedy’s eyelid trembles. The knife lies by Speedy’s hand, wet with sea dew.
The universe is still.
Go in de water, Byrum.
NO!
Go in de water, mon.
Byrum Watler.
White sky.
Two figures in a boat. The world is empty.
I hearin birdsong but dere be no bird. Seem like I dreamin.
No, mon.
Speedy—?
No, mon. Ain’t no goin back.
You a hard mon, Speedy.
No, mon. I go ahead every day, do what I got to do.
Oh! I dyin here dis day! Gone to foller Byrum Watler into de sea!
Go den, Wodie. I can’t keep you.
Daybreak. High in the west, a lone cloud following the night is caught by the sun still under the horizon. The cloud turns pink.
Shark got him! Drawn to de blood! I
feels
it!
Hush, Wodie, hush.
I never walked de left-hand path, danced widdershins, nor worked nobody woe. But dey will say dat Wodie Greaves took de life of Byrum Watler out in de cays!
The hard line of the sky, surrounding.
It was a holiday in de month of May
… oh, yes! Call dat de maypole, and de gumbo limbo,
dat
is called red birch. Oh, I was raised up in de island, and know everything dat grows dere, cause dat Old Rock is my home.
Wodie follows Speedy’s gaze to the wind banks in the eastern sky. His eye is staring.
Oh, yes! De corals is fillin it in!
I hoppy to see you hoppy again, Wodie.
Oh, we be hoppy in de bushes, too.
Best drink dis little water, mon. Cause we get wind out of dat sky, we gone to make it, hear me, mon?
One mon in a blue boat and de child face down in de mornin sea. One mon in a blue boat dat say goodbye, settin dere at de tiller in de manner dat you doin and lookin at me like de way you lookin. (
weeps
) Remember de way dat his eyes shine? I knew right away den, I had sign.
What you sayin, Wodie? Just drink dis little water.
De people, de people will be sorry to see
De graveyard for Bonnie and de gallows for me
…
Dat is a sad song, Wodie, but you got a pretty voice.
Dat mon in de blue boat, dat mon is you.
The last light glances from the wings of a white tropic bird high in the south.
Night falling.
wild stars
horizon
night-blue sea
Wodie Greaves.
Noon.
White sun, white sky.
slap
slap
Parting the water, the great mantas catapult into the sky, spinning white bellies to the sun—black, white, white, black. Slowly they fall into the sea. In the windlessness the falls resound from the horizons.
Near the silent boat, a solitary ray rolls over and over in backward arcs, wings rippling, white belly with its eye-like gills revolving slowly just beneath the surface.
Nemmine, Speedy-mon. (
sighs
) My oh my.
Twin wing tips part the leaden surface, holding a moment as if listening. Then water rushes softly and is still.